Although many of the FBI's functions are unique, its activities in support of national security are comparable to those of the British MI5 and the Russian FSB. Unlike the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), which has no law enforcement authority and is focused on intelligence collection abroad, the FBI is primarily a domestic agency, maintaining 56 field offices in major cities throughout the United States, and more than 400 resident agencies in lesser cities and areas across the nation. At an FBI field office, a senior-level FBI officer concurrently serves as the representative of the Director of National Intelligence.[6][7]

Despite its domestic focus, the FBI also maintains a significant international footprint, operating 60 Legal Attache (LEGAT) offices and 15 sub-offices in US embassies and consulates across the globe. These foreign offices exist primarily for the purpose of coordination with foreign security services and do not usually conduct unilateral operations in the host countries.[8] The FBI can and does at times carry out secret activities overseas,[9] just as the CIA has a limited domestic function; these activities generally require coordination across government agencies.

Budget, mission, and priorities

FBI Domestic Investigations and Operations Guide

In the fiscal year 2016, the Bureau's total budget was approximately $8.7 billion.[2]

The FBI's main goal is to protect and defend the United States, to uphold and enforce the criminal laws of the United States, and to provide leadership and criminal justice services to federal, state, municipal, and international agencies and partners.[5]

Bonaparte reached out to other agencies, including the U.S. Secret Service, for personnel, investigators in particular. On May 27, 1908, the Congress forbade this use of Treasury employees by the Justice Department, citing fears that the new agency would serve as a secret police department.[13] Again at Roosevelt's urging, Bonaparte moved to organize a formal Bureau of Investigation, which would then have its own staff of special agents.[11]

Creation

The Bureau of Investigation (BOI) was created on July 26, 1908, after the Congress had adjourned for the summer.[11] Attorney General Bonaparte, using Department of Justice expense funds,[11] hired thirty-four people, including some veterans of the Secret Service,[14][15] to work for a new investigative agency. Its first "Chief" (the title is now known as "Director") was Stanley Finch. Bonaparte notified the Congress of these actions in December 1908.[11]

The bureau's first official task was visiting and making surveys of the houses of prostitution in preparation for enforcing the "White Slave Traffic Act," or Mann Act, passed on June 25, 1910. In 1932, the bureau was renamed the United States Bureau of Investigation. The following year it was linked to the Bureau of Prohibition and rechristened the Division of Investigation (DOI) before finally becoming an independent service within the Department of Justice in 1935.[14] In the same year, its name was officially changed from the Division of Investigation to the present-day Federal Bureau of Investigation, or FBI.

J. Edgar Hoover as FBI Director

J. Edgar Hoover, FBI Director from 1924 to 1972

J. Edgar Hoover served as FBI Director from 1924 to 1972, a combined 48 years with the BOI, DOI, and FBI. He was chiefly responsible for creating the Scientific Crime Detection Laboratory, or the FBI Laboratory, which officially opened in 1932, as part of his work to professionalize investigations by the government. Hoover was substantially involved in most major cases and projects that the FBI handled during his tenure. But as detailed below, his proved to be a highly controversial tenure as Bureau Director, especially in its later years. After Hoover's death, the Congress passed legislation that limited the tenure of future FBI Directors to ten years.

Other activities of its early decades included a decisive role in reducing the scope and influence of the Ku Klux Klan. Additionally, through the work of Edwin Atherton, the BOI claimed success in apprehending an entire army of Mexican neo-revolutionaries under the leadership of General Enrique Estrada in the mid-1920s, east of San Diego, California.

Hoover began using wiretapping in the 1920s during Prohibition to arrest bootleggers.[16] In the 1927 case Olmstead v. United States, in which a bootlegger was caught through telephone tapping, the United States Supreme Court ruled that FBI wiretaps did not violate the Fourth Amendment as unlawful search and seizure, as long as the FBI did not break into a person's home to complete the tapping.[16] After Prohibition's repeal, Congress passed the Communications Act of 1934, which outlawed non-consensual phone tapping, but did allow bugging.[16] In the 1939 case Nardone v. United States, the court ruled that due to the 1934 law, evidence the FBI obtained by phone tapping was inadmissible in court.[16] After the 1967 case Katz v. United States overturned the 1927 case that had allowed bugging, Congress passed the Omnibus Crime Control Act, allowing public authorities to tap telephones during investigations, as long as they obtained warrants beforehand.[16]

National security

Beginning in the 1940s and continuing into the 1970s, the bureau investigated cases of espionage against the United States and its allies. Eight Nazi agents who had planned sabotage operations against American targets were arrested, and six were executed (Ex parte Quirin) under their sentences. Also during this time, a joint US/UK code-breaking effort called "The Venona Project"—with which the FBI was heavily involved—broke Soviet diplomatic and intelligence communications codes, allowing the US and British governments to read Soviet communications. This effort confirmed the existence of Americans working in the United States for Soviet intelligence.[17] Hoover was administering this project, but he failed to notify the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) of it until 1952. Another notable case was the arrest of Soviet spy Rudolf Abel in 1957.[18] The discovery of Soviet spies operating in the US allowed Hoover to pursue his longstanding obsession with the threat he perceived from the American Left, ranging from Communist Party of the United States of America (CPUSA) union organizers to American liberals.

Japanese American internment

In 1939, the Bureau began compiling a custodial detention list with the names of those who would be taken into custody in the event of war with Axis nations. The majority of the names on the list belonged to Issei community leaders, as the FBI investigation built on an existing Naval Intelligence index that had focused on Japanese Americans in Hawaii and the West Coast, but many German and Italian nationals also found their way onto the secret list.[19] Robert Shivers, head of the Honolulu office, obtained permission from Hoover to start detaining those on the list on December 7, 1941, while bombs were still falling over Pearl Harbor.[20] Mass arrests and searches of homes (in most cases conducted without warrants) began a few hours after the attack, and over the next several weeks more than 5,500 Issei men were taken into FBI custody.[21] On February 19, 1942, President Franklin Roosevelt issued Executive Order 9066, authorizing the removal of Japanese Americans from the West Coast. FBI Director Hoover opposed the subsequent mass removal and confinement of Japanese Americans authorized under Executive Order 9066, but Roosevelt prevailed.[22] The vast majority went along with the subsequent exclusion orders, but in a handful of cases where Japanese Americans refused to obey the new military regulations, FBI agents handled their arrests.[20] The Bureau continued surveillance on Japanese Americans throughout the war, conducting background checks on applicants for resettlement outside camp, and entering the camps (usually without the permission of War Relocation Authority officials) and grooming informants to monitor dissidents and "troublemakers." After the war, the FBI was assigned to protect returning Japanese Americans from attacks by hostile white communities.[20]

Sex deviates program

According to Douglas M. Charles, the FBI's "sex deviates" program began on April 10, 1950 when J. Edgar Hoover forwarded the White House, U.S. Civil Service Commission, and branches of the armed services a list of 393 alleged federal employees who were allegedly arrested in Washington D.C., since 1947, on charges of "sexual irregularities". On June 20, 1951, Hoover expanded the program by issuing a memo establishing a "uniform policy for the handling of the increasing number of reports and allegations concerning present and past employees of the United State Government who assertedly [sic] are sex deviates." The program was expanded to include non-government jobs. According to Athan Theoharis, "In 1951 he [Hoover] had unilaterally instituted a Sex Deviates program to purge alleged homosexuals from any position in the federal government, from the lowliest clerk to the more powerful position of White house aide." On May 27, 1953, Executive Order 10450 went into effect. The program was expanded further by this executive order by making all federal employment of homosexuals illegal. On July 8, 1953, the FBI forwarded to the U.S. Civil Service Commission information from the sex deviates program. In 1977–1978, 300,000 pages, collected between 1930 to the mid-1970s, in the sex deviates program were destroyed by FBI officials.[23][24][25]

Civil rights movement

During the 1950s and 1960s, FBI officials became increasingly concerned about the influence of civil rights leaders, whom they believed either had communist ties or were unduly influenced by communists or "fellow travellers." In 1956, for example, Hoover sent an open letter denouncing Dr. T. R. M. Howard, a civil rights leader, surgeon, and wealthy entrepreneur in Mississippi who had criticized FBI inaction in solving recent murders of George W. Lee, Emmett Till, and other blacks in the South.[26] The FBI carried out controversial domestic surveillance in an operation it called the COINTELPRO, a portmanteau derived from "COunter-INTELligence PROgram."[27] It was to investigate and disrupt the activities of dissident political organizations within the United States, including both militant and non-violent organizations. Among its targets was the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, a leading civil rights organization whose clergy leadership included the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., who is addressed in more detail below.[28]

The FBI frequently investigated Martin Luther King, Jr. In the mid-1960s, King began publicly criticizing the Bureau for giving insufficient attention to the use of terrorism by white supremacists. Hoover responded by publicly calling King the most "notorious liar" in the United States.[30] In his 1991 memoir, Washington Post journalist Carl Rowan asserted that the FBI had sent at least one anonymous letter to King encouraging him to commit suicide.[31] Historian Taylor Branch documents an anonymous November 1964 "suicide package" sent by the Bureau that combined a letter to the civil rights leader telling him "You are done. There is only one way out for you..." with audio recordings of King's sexual indiscretions.[32]

In March 1971, the residential office of an FBI agent in Media, Pennsylvania was burgled by a group calling itself the Citizens' Commission to Investigate the FBI. Numerous files were taken and distributed to a range of newspapers, including The Harvard Crimson.[33] The files detailed the FBI's extensive COINTELPRO program, which included investigations into lives of ordinary citizens—including a black student group at a Pennsylvania military college and the daughter of Congressman Henry Reuss of Wisconsin.[33] The country was "jolted" by the revelations, which included assassinations of political activists, and the actions were denounced by members of the Congress, including House Majority Leader Hale Boggs.[33] The phones of some members of the Congress, including Boggs, had allegedly been tapped.[33]

Kennedy's assassination

When President John F. Kennedy was shot and killed, the jurisdiction fell to the local police departments until President Lyndon B. Johnson directed the FBI to take over the investigation.[34] To ensure clarity about the responsibility for investigation of homicides of federal officials, the Congress passed a law that included investigations of such deaths of federal officials, especially by homicide, within FBI jurisdiction. This new law was passed in 1965.[35][36][37]

Organized crime

In response to organized crime, on August 25, 1953, the FBI created the Top Hoodlum Program. The national office directed field offices to gather information on mobsters in their territories and to report it regularly to Washington for a centralized collection of intelligence on racketeers.[38] After the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act, or RICO Act, took effect, the FBI began investigating the former Prohibition-organized groups, which had become fronts for crime in major cities and small towns. All of the FBI work was done undercover and from within these organizations, using the provisions provided in the RICO Act. Gradually the agency dismantled many of the groups. Although Hoover initially denied the existence of a National Crime Syndicate in the United States, the Bureau later conducted operations against known organized crime syndicates and families, including those headed by Sam Giancana and John Gotti. The RICO Act is still used today for all organized crime and any individuals who may fall under the Act's provisions.

In 2003 a congressional committee called the FBI's organized crime informant program "one of the greatest failures in the history of federal law enforcement."[39] The FBI allowed four innocent men to be convicted of the March 1965 gangland murder of Edward "Teddy" Deegan in order to protect Vincent Flemmi, an FBI informant. Three of the men were sentenced to death (which was later reduced to life in prison), and the fourth defendant was sentenced to life in prison.[39] Two of the four men died in prison after serving almost 30 years, and two others were released after serving 32 and 36 years. In July 2007, U.S. District Judge Nancy Gertner in Boston found that the Bureau had helped convict the four men using false witness accounts given by mobster Joseph Barboza. The U.S. Government was ordered to pay $100 million in damages to the four defendants.[40]

Special FBI teams

In 1982, the FBI formed an elite unit[41] to help with problems that might arise at the 1984 Summer Olympics to be held in Los Angeles, particularly terrorism and major-crime. This was a result of the 1972 Summer Olympics in Munich, Germany, when terrorists murdered the Israeli athletes. Named the Hostage Rescue Team, or HRT, it acts as the FBI lead for a national SWAT team in related procedures and all counter-terrorism cases. Also formed in 1984 was the Computer Analysis and Response Team, or CART.[42]

From the end of the 1980s to the early 1990s, the FBI reassigned more than 300 agents from foreign counter-intelligence duties to violent crime, and made violent crime the sixth national priority. With reduced cuts to other well-established departments, and because terrorism was no longer considered a threat after the end of the Cold War,[42] the FBI assisted local and state police forces in tracking fugitives who had crossed state lines, which is a federal offense. The FBI Laboratory helped develop DNA testing, continuing its pioneering role in identification that began with its fingerprinting system in 1924.

After Congress passed the Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act (CALEA, 1994), the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA, 1996), and the Economic Espionage Act (EEA, 1996), the FBI followed suit and underwent a technological upgrade in 1998, just as it did with its CART team in 1991. Computer Investigations and Infrastructure Threat Assessment Center (CITAC) and the National Infrastructure Protection Center (NIPC) were created to deal with the increase in Internet-related problems, such as computer viruses, worms, and other malicious programs that threatened US operations. With these developments, the FBI increased its electronic surveillance in public safety and national security investigations, adapting to the telecommunications advancements that changed the nature of such problems.

September 11 attacks

September 11 attacks at the Pentagon

During the September 11, 2001, attacks on the World Trade Center, FBI agent Leonard W. Hatton Jr. was killed during the rescue effort while helping the rescue personnel evacuate the occupants of the South Tower, and he stayed when it collapsed. Within months after the attacks, FBI Director Robert Mueller, who had been sworn in a week before the attacks, called for a re-engineering of FBI structure and operations. He made countering every federal crime a top priority, including the prevention of terrorism, countering foreign intelligence operations, addressing cyber security threats, other high-tech crimes, protecting civil rights, combating public corruption, organized crime, white-collar crime, and major acts of violent crime.[45]

In February 2001, Robert Hanssen was caught selling information to the Russian government. It was later learned that Hanssen, who had reached a high position within the FBI, had been selling intelligence since as early as 1979. He pleaded guilty to treason and received a life sentence in 2002, but the incident led many to question the security practices employed by the FBI. There was also a claim that Hanssen might have contributed information that led to the September 11, 2001 attacks.[46]

The 9/11 Commission's final report on July 22, 2004, stated that the FBI and Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) were both partially to blame for not pursuing intelligence reports that could have prevented the September 11, 2001, attacks. In its most damning assessment, the report concluded that the country had "not been well served" by either agency and listed numerous recommendations for changes within the FBI.[47] While the FBI did accede to most of the recommendations, including oversight by the new Director of National Intelligence, some former members of the 9/11 Commission publicly criticized the FBI in October 2005, claiming it was resisting any meaningful changes.[48]

On July 8, 2007, The Washington Post published excerpts from UCLA Professor Amy Zegart's book Spying Blind: The CIA, the FBI, and the Origins of 9/11.[49] The Post reported, from Zegart's book, that government documents showed that both the CIA and the FBI had missed 23 potential chances to disrupt the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. The primary reasons for the failures included: agency cultures resistant to change and new ideas; inappropriate incentives for promotion; and a lack of cooperation between the FBI, CIA and the rest of the United States Intelligence Community. The book blamed the FBI's decentralized structure, which prevented effective communication and cooperation among different FBI offices. The book suggested that the FBI had not evolved into an effective counter-terrorism or counter-intelligence agency, due in large part to deeply ingrained agency cultural resistance to change. For example, FBI personnel practices continued to treat all staff other than special agents as support staff, classifying intelligence analysts alongside the FBI's auto mechanics and janitors.[50]

Faulty bullet analysis

For over 40 years, the FBI crime lab in Quantico had believed that lead alloys used in bullets had unique chemical signatures. It was analyzing the bullets with the goal of matching them chemically, not only to a single batch of ammunition coming out of a factory, but also to a single box of bullets. The National Academy of Sciences conducted an 18-month independent review of comparative bullet-lead analysis. In 2003, its National Research Council published a report whose conclusions called into question 30 years of FBI testimony. It found the analytic model used by the FBI for interpreting results was deeply flawed, and the conclusion, that bullet fragments could be matched to a box of ammunition, was so overstated that it was misleading under the rules of evidence. One year later, the FBI decided to stop conducting bullet lead analyses.[51]

After a 60 Minutes/Washington Post investigation in November 2007, two years later, the Bureau agreed to identify, review, and release all pertinent cases, and notify prosecutors about cases in which faulty testimony was given.[52]

Organization

Organizational structure

The FBI is organized into functional branches and the Office of the Director, which contains most administrative offices. An executive assistant director manages each branch. Each branch is then divided into offices and divisions, each headed by an assistant director. The various divisions are further divided into sub-branches, led by deputy assistant directors. Within these sub-branches there are various sections headed by section chiefs. Section chiefs are ranked analogous to special agents in charge.

Four of the branches report to the deputy director while two report to the associate director. The functions branches of the FBI are:

The Office of the Director serves as the central administrative organ of the FBI. The office provides staff support functions (such as finance and facilities management) to the five function branches and the various field divisions. The office is managed by the FBI associate director, who also oversees the operations of both the Information and Technology and Human Resources Branches.

Legal authority

The FBI's mandate is established in Title 28 of the United States Code (U.S. Code), Section 533, which authorizes the Attorney General to "appoint officials to detect and prosecute crimes against the United States."[54] Other federal statutes give the FBI the authority and responsibility to investigate specific crimes.

The USA PATRIOT Act increased the powers allotted to the FBI, especially in wiretapping and monitoring of Internet activity. One of the most controversial provisions of the act is the so-called sneak and peek provision, granting the FBI powers to search a house while the residents are away, and not requiring them to notify the residents for several weeks afterwards. Under the PATRIOT Act's provisions, the FBI also resumed inquiring into the library records[55] of those who are suspected of terrorism (something it had supposedly not done since the 1970s).

In the early 1980s, Senate hearings were held to examine FBI undercover operations in the wake of the Abscam controversy, which had allegations of entrapment of elected officials. As a result, in following years a number of guidelines were issued to constrain FBI activities.

A March 2007 report by the inspector general of the Justice Department described the FBI's "widespread and serious misuse" of national security letters, a form of administrative subpoena used to demand records and data pertaining to individuals. The report said that between 2003 and 2005, the FBI had issued more than 140,000 national security letters, many involving people with no obvious connections to terrorism.[56]

Information obtained through an FBI investigation is presented to the appropriate U.S. Attorney or Department of Justice official, who decides if prosecution or other action is warranted.

There are 565 federally recognized American Indian Tribes in the United States, and the FBI has federal law enforcement responsibility on nearly 200 Indian reservations. This federal jurisdiction is shared concurrently with the Bureau of Indian Affairs, Office of Justice Services (BIA-OJS).

Located within the FBI's Criminal Investigative Division, the Indian Country Crimes Unit (ICCU) is responsible for developing and implementing strategies, programs, and policies to address identified crime problems in Indian Country (IC) for which the FBI has responsibility.

The FBI does not specifically list crimes in Native American land as one of its priorities.[61] Often serious crimes have been either poorly investigated or prosecution has been declined. Tribal courts can impose sentences of up to three years, under certain restrictions.[62][63]

According to The Washington Post, the FBI "is building a vast repository controlled by people who work in a top-secret vault on the fourth floor of the J. Edgar Hoover Building in Washington. This one stores the profiles of tens of thousands of Americans and legal residents who are not accused of any crime. What they have done is appear to be acting suspiciously to a town sheriff, a traffic cop or even a neighbor."[65]

The FBI Laboratory, established with the formation of the BOI,[67] did not appear in the J. Edgar Hoover Building until its completion in 1974. The lab serves as the primary lab for most DNA, biological, and physical work. Public tours of FBI headquarters ran through the FBI laboratory workspace before the move to the J. Edgar Hoover Building. The services the lab conducts include Chemistry, Combined DNA Index System (CODIS), Computer Analysis and Response, DNA Analysis, Evidence Response, Explosives, Firearms and Tool marks, Forensic Audio, Forensic Video, Image Analysis, Forensic Science Research, Forensic Science Training, Hazardous Materials Response, Investigative and Prospective Graphics, Latent Prints, Materials Analysis, Questioned Documents, Racketeering Records, Special Photographic Analysis, Structural Design, and Trace Evidence.[68] The services of the FBI Laboratory are used by many state, local, and international agencies free of charge. The lab also maintains a second lab at the FBI Academy.

The FBI Academy, located in Quantico, Virginia, is home to the communications and computer laboratory the FBI utilizes. It is also where new agents are sent for training to become FBI Special Agents. Going through the 21-week course is required for every Special Agent.[69] First opened for use in 1972, the facility located on 385 acres (1.6 km2) of woodland. The Academy trains state and local law enforcement agencies, which are invited to the law enforcement training center. The FBI units that reside at Quantico are the Field and Police Training Unit, Firearms Training Unit, Forensic Science Research and Training Center, Technology Services Unit (TSU), Investigative Training Unit, Law Enforcement Communication Unit, Leadership and Management Science Units (LSMU), Physical Training Unit, New Agents' Training Unit (NATU), Practical Applications Unit (PAU), the Investigative Computer Training Unit and the "College of Analytical Studies."

In 2000, the FBI began the Trilogy project to upgrade its outdated information technology (IT) infrastructure. This project, originally scheduled to take three years and cost around $380 million, ended up over budget and behind schedule.[70] Efforts to deploy modern computers and networking equipment were generally successful, but attempts to develop new investigation software, outsourced to Science Applications International Corporation (SAIC), were not. Virtual Case File, or VCF, as the software was known, was plagued by poorly defined goals, and repeated changes in management.[71] In January 2005, more than two years after the software was originally planned for completion, the FBI officially abandoned the project. At least $100 million (and much more by some estimates) was spent on the project, which never became operational. The FBI has been forced to continue using its decade-old Automated Case Support system, which IT experts consider woefully inadequate. In March 2005, the FBI announced it was beginning a new, more ambitious software project, code-named Sentinel, which they expected to complete by 2009.[72]

Carnivore was an electronic eavesdropping software system implemented by the FBI during the Clinton administration; it was designed to monitor email and electronic communications. After prolonged negative coverage in the press, the FBI changed the name of its system from "Carnivore" to "DCS1000." DCS is reported to stand for "Digital Collection System"; the system has the same functions as before. The Associated Press reported in mid-January 2005 that the FBI essentially abandoned the use of Carnivore in 2001, in favor of commercially available software, such as NarusInsight.

The Criminal Justice Information Services (CJIS) Division[73] is located in Clarksburg, West Virginia. Organized beginning in 1991, the office opened in 1995 as the youngest agency division. The complex is the length of three football fields. It provides a main repository for information in various data systems. Under the roof of the CJIS are the programs for the National Crime Information Center (NCIC), Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR), Fingerprint Identification, Integrated Automated Fingerprint Identification System (IAFIS), NCIC 2000, and the National Incident-Based Reporting System (NIBRS). Many state and local agencies use these data systems as a source for their own investigations and contribute to the database using secure communications. FBI provides these tools of sophisticated identification and information services to local, state, federal, and international law enforcement agencies.

Personnel

As of December 31, 2009, the FBI had a total of 33,852 employees. That includes 13,412 special agents and 20,420 support professionals, such as intelligence analysts, language specialists, scientists, information technology specialists, and other professionals.[75]

Hiring process

To apply to become an FBI agent, one must be between the ages of 23 and 37. Due to the decision in Robert P. Isabella v. Department of State and Office of Personnel Management, 2008 M.S.P.B. 146, preference-eligible veterans may apply after age 37. In 2009, the Office of Personnel Management issued implementation guidance on the Isabella decision.[77] The applicant must also hold U.S. citizenship, be of high moral character, have a clean record, and hold at least a four-year bachelor's degree. At least three years of professional work experience prior to application is also required. All FBI employees require a Top Secret (TS) security clearance, and in many instances, employees need a TS/SCI (Top Secret/Sensitive Compartmented Information) clearance.[78] To obtain a security clearance, all potential FBI personnel must pass a series of Single Scope Background Investigations (SSBI), which are conducted by the Office of Personnel Management.[79] Special agent candidates also have to pass a Physical Fitness Test (PFT), which includes a 300-meter run, one-minute sit-ups, maximum push-ups, and a 1.5-mile (2.4 km) run. Personnel must pass a polygraph test with questions including possible drug use.[80] Applicants who fail polygraphs may not gain employment with the FBI.[81] Up until 1975, the FBI had a minimum height requirement of 5 feet 7 inches (170 cm).[82]

BOI and FBI directors

FBI Directors are appointed (nominated) by the President of the United States and must be confirmed by the United States Senate to serve a term of office of ten years, subject to resignation or removal by the President at his/her discretion before their term ends. Additional terms are allowed following the same procedure

J. Edgar Hoover, appointed by President Calvin Coolidge in 1924, was by far the longest-serving director, serving until his death in 1972. In 1968, Congress passed legislation, as part of the Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act of 1968, requiring Senate confirmation of appointments of future Directors.[83] As the incumbent, this legislation did not apply to Hoover. The last FBI Director was James B. Comey, who was appointed in 2013 by President Barack Obama. In 2017 he was fired by President Donald J. Trump.[84]

Firearms

A Glock 22 pistol in .40 S&W caliber

Upon qualification, an FBI special agent is issued a full-size Glock 22 or compact Glock 23 semi-automatic pistol, both of which are chambered in the .40 S&Wcartridge. In May 1997, the FBI officially adopted the Glock, in .40 S&W, for general agent use, and first issued it to New Agent Class 98-1 in October 1997. At present, the Glock 23 "FG&R" (finger groove and rail; either 3rd generation or "Gen4") is the issue sidearm.[85] New agents are issued firearms, on which they must qualify, on successful completion of their training at the FBI Academy. The Glock 26 (subcompact 9mm Parabellum), Glock 23 and Glock 27 (.40 S&W compact and subcompact, respectively) are authorized as secondary weapons. Special agents are also authorized to purchase and qualify with the Glock 21 in .45 ACP.[86]

In June 2016, the FBI awarded Glock a contract for new handguns. Unlike the currently issued .40 S&W chambered Glock pistols, the new Glocks will be chambered for 9mm Parabellum. The contract is for the full-size Glock 17M and the compact Glock 19M. The "M" means the Glocks have been modified to meet government standards specified by a 2015 government request for proposal.[90][91][92][93]

Crime statistics

In the 1920s, the FBI began issuing crime reports by gathering numbers from local police departments.[97] Due to limitations of this system found during the 1960s and 1970s—victims often simply did not report crimes to the police in the first place—the Department of Justice developed an alternate method of tallying crime, the victimization survey.[97]

Uniform Crime Reports

The Uniform Crime Reports (UCR) compile data from over 17,000 law enforcement agencies across the country. They provide detailed data regarding the volume of crimes to include arrest, clearance (or closing a case), and law enforcement officer information. The UCR focuses its data collection on violent crimes, hate crimes, and property crimes.[96] Created in the 1920s, the UCR system has not proven to be as uniform as its name implies. The UCR data only reflect the most serious offense in the case of connected crimes and has a very restrictive definition of rape. Since about 93% of the data submitted to the FBI is in this format, the UCR stands out as the publication of choice as most states require law enforcement agencies to submit this data.

Preliminary Annual Uniform Crime Report for 2006 was released on June 4, 2006. The report shows violent crime offenses rose 1.3%, but the number of property crime offenses decreased 2.9% compared to 2005.[98]

National Incident-Based Reporting System

The National Incident-Based Reporting System (NIBRS) crime statistics system aims to address limitations inherent in UCR data. The system is used by law enforcement agencies in the United States for collecting and reporting data on crimes. Local, state, and federal agencies generate NIBRS data from their records management systems. Data is collected on every incident and arrest in the Group A offense category. The Group A offenses are 46 specific crimes grouped in 22 offense categories. Specific facts about these offenses are gathered and reported in the NIBRS system. In addition to the Group A offenses, eleven Group B offenses are reported with only the arrest information. The NIBRS system is in greater detail than the summary-based UCR system. As of 2004, 5,271 law enforcement agencies submitted NIBRS data. That amount represents 20% of the United States population and 16% of the crime statistics data collected by the FBI.

eGuardian

eGuardian is the name of an FBI system, launched in January 2009, to share tips about possible terror threats with local police agencies. The program aims to get law enforcement at all levels sharing data quickly about suspicious activity and people.[99]

eGuardian enables near real-time sharing and tracking of terror information and suspicious activities with local, state, tribal, and federal agencies. The eGuardian system is a spin-off of a similar but classified tool called Guardian that has been used inside the FBI, and shared with vetted partners since 2005.[100]

Controversies

Throughout its history, the bureau has been the subject of a number of controversial cases, both at home and abroad.

Covert operations on political groups

COINTELPRO tactics have been alleged to include discrediting targets through psychological warfare; smearing individuals and groups using forged documents and by planting false reports in the media; harassment; wrongful imprisonment; and illegal violence.[102][103] The FBI's stated motivation was "protecting national security, preventing violence, and maintaining the existing social and political order."[104]

Files on Puerto Rican independence advocates

The FBI also spied upon and collected information on Puerto Rican independence leader Pedro Albizu Campos and his Nationalist political party in the 1930s. Abizu Campos was convicted three times in connection with deadly attacks on US government officials: in 1937 (Conspiracy to overthrow the government of the United States), in 1950 (attempted murder), and in 1954 (after an armed assault on the US House of Representatives while in session; although not present, Abizu Campos was considered the mastermind).[117] The FBI operation was covert and did not become known until U.S. Congressman Luis Gutierrez had it made public via the Freedom of Information Act in the 1980s.[118]

In the 2000s, researchers obtained files released by the FBI under the Freedom of Information Act revealing that the San Juan FBI office had coordinated with FBI offices in New York, Chicago and other cities, in a decades-long surveillance of Albizu Campos and Puerto Ricans who had contact or communication with him. The documents available are as recent as 1965.[119][120]

Activities in Latin America

From the 1950s to the 1980s, the governments of many Latin American and Caribbean countries, including Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Cuba, Mexico and others were infiltrated by the FBI.[121] These operations began in World War II as 700 agents were assigned to monitor Nazi activity, but soon expanded to monitoring communist activity in places like Ecuador.[122]

Internal investigations of shootings

During the period from 1993 to 2011, FBI agents fired their weapons on 289 occasions; FBI internal reviews found the shots justified in all but 5 cases, in none of the 5 cases were people wounded. Samuel Walker, a professor of criminal justice at the University of Nebraska Omaha said the number of shots found to be unjustified was "suspiciously low." In the same time period, the FBI wounded 150 people, 70 of whom died; the FBI found all 150 shootings to be justified. Likewise, during the period from 2011 to the present, all shootings by FBI agents have been found to be justified by internal investigation. In a 2002 case in Maryland, an innocent man was shot, and later paid $1.3 million by the FBI after agents mistook him for a bank robber; the internal investigation found that the shooting was justified, based on the man's actions.[123]

In December 1994, after being tipped off by his former FBI handler about a pending indictment under the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act, Bulger fled Boston and went into hiding. For 16 years, he remained at large. For 12 of those years, Bulger was prominently listed on the FBI Ten Most Wanted Fugitives list.[131] Beginning in 1997, the New England media exposed criminal actions by federal, state, and local law enforcement officials tied to Bulger. The revelation caused great embarrassment to the FBI.[132][133][134] In 2002, Special Agent John J Connolly was convicted of federal racketeering charges for helping Bulger avoid arrest. In 2008, Special Agent Connolly completed his term on the federal charges and was transferred to Florida where he was convicted of helping plan the murder of John B Callahan, a Bulger rival. In 2014, that conviction was overturned on a technicality. Connolly was the agent leading the investigation of Bulger.[135]

Death of Filiberto Ojeda Rios

In 2005, fugitive Puerto Rican Nationalist leader Filiberto Ojeda Ríos died in a gun battle with FBI agents that some charged was an assassination.[citation needed] Puerto Rico Governor Aníbal Acevedo Vilá criticized the FBI assault as "improper" and "highly irregular" and demanded to know why his government was not informed of it.[149] The FBI refused to release information beyond the official press release, citing security and agent privacy issues. The Puerto Rico Justice Department filed suit in federal court against the FBI and the US Attorney General, demanding information crucial to the Commonwealth's own investigation of the incident. The case was dismissed by the U.S Supreme Court.[150] Ojeda Rios' funeral was attended by a long list of dignitaries, including the highest authority of the Roman Catholic Church in Puerto Rico, Archbishop Roberto Octavio González Nieves, ex-Governor Rafael Hernández Colón, and numerous other personalities.[151]

In the aftermath of his death, the United NationsSpecial Committee on Decolonization approved a draft resolution urging a "probe of [the] pro-independence killing, human rights abuses", after "Petitioner after petitioner condemned the assassination of Mr. Ojeda Rios by agents of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI)".[152]

Associated Press impersonation case

In 2007, an agent working in Seattle, Washington for the FBI falsely impersonated an Associated Press (AP) journalist and unwittingly infected a 15-year-old suspect's computer with a malicious surveillance software.[153][154] The incident sparked a strongly-worded statement from the AP demanding the bureau from ever impersonating a member of the news media again.[155] Moreover, in September 2016 the incident resulted in a condemnation by the Justice Department.[156]

In December 2017, following a US court appearance, a judge ruled in favor of the AP in a lawsuit against the FBI for frauduently impersonating a member of the news media.[157][158]

Wikipedia edits

In August 2007 Virgil Griffith, a Caltech computation and neural-systems graduate student, created WikiScanner, a searchable database that linked changes made by anonymous Wikipedia editors to companies and organizations from which the changes were made. The database cross-referenced logs of Wikipedia edits with publicly available records pertaining to the Internet IP addresses edits were made from.[159] Griffith was motivated by the edits from the United States Congress,[160][161][162][163] and wanted to see if others were similarly promoting themselves. The tool was designed to detect conflict of interest edits.[164] Among his findings were that FBI computers were used to edit the FBI article on Wikipedia.[165] Although the edits correlated with known FBI IP addresses, there was no proof that the changes actually came from a member or employee of the FBI, only that someone who had access to their network had edited the FBI article on Wikipedia.[161] Wikipedia spokespersons received Griffith's "WikiScanner" positively, noting that it helped prevent conflicts of interest from influencing articles[165] as well as increasing transparency[161][166] and mitigating attempts to remove or distort relevant facts.[167]

Hillary Clinton email investigation

On July 5, 2016, FBI Director Comey announced the bureau's recommendation that the United States Department of Justice file no criminal charges relating to the Hillary Clinton email controversy.[168] During an unusual 15 minute press conference in the J. Edgar Hoover Building, Comey called Secretary Clinton's and her top aides' behavior "extremely careless", but concluded that "no reasonable prosecutor would bring such a case".[168] On October 28, 2016, less than two weeks before the presidential election, Director Comey, a long-time Republican, announced in a letter to Congress that additional emails potentially related to the Clinton email controversy had been found and that the FBI will investigate "to determine whether they contain classified information as well as to assess their importance to our investigation."[169] At the time Comey sent his letter to Congress, the FBI had still not obtained a warrant to review any of the e-mails in question and was not aware of the content of any of the e-mails in question.[170] After Comey's letter to Congress, commentator Paul Callan of CNN and Niall O'Dowd of Irish Central compared Comey to J. Edgar Hoover in attempting to influence and manipulate elections. On November 6, 2016, in the face of constant pressure from both Republicans and Democrats, Comey conceded in a second letter to Congress that through the FBI's review of the new e-mails, there was no wrongdoing by Clinton. On November 12, 2016, unsuccessful presidential candidate Hillary Clinton directly attributed her election loss to FBI Director James Comey.[171]

2017 dismissal of Director Comey

On May 9, 2017, President Trump dismissed FBI Director Comey after Comey had misstated several key findings of the email investigation in his testimony to the Senate Judiciary Committee.[172] Some[who?] question whether the dismissal was in response to Comey's request for more resources to expand the probe into Russian interference into the Presidential election.[173] Following Comey's dismissal, Deputy Director Andrew G. McCabe became Acting Director.[174] On August 1, 2017, President Trump's nominee for FBI director Christopher A. Wray was officially confirmed by the Senate in a 92–5 vote and was sworn in as Director the next day.[175]

The Nunes memo

On February 2, 2018, a four-page confidential memo by Republican House Intelligence Committee chairman Devin Nunes, was released after being signed by President Trump. According to the memo, a dossier by Christopher Steele and opposition research firm Fusion GPS, was utilized by DOJ and FBI officials for FISA warrants to surveil Trump's campaign member Carter Page. Additionally, former FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe, who resigned before the release of the memo, stated that the FISA warrant wouldn't have been obtained without the information in the Steele dossier. All four FISA applications were signed by McCabe, Rod Rosenstein, and former FBI Director James Comey.[176] President Trump commented on the release of the memo, saying: "A lot of people should be ashamed."[177]

Florida school shooting

On February 16, 2018, two days after the Stoneman Douglas High School shooting, the FBI released a statement detailing information the organization's Public Access Line had received a month prior, on January 5, from a person close to Nikolas Cruz, the suspected shooter. According to the statement, "The caller provided information about Cruz's gun ownership, desire to kill people, erratic behavior, and disturbing social media posts, as well as the potential of him conducting a school shooting." After conducting an investigation, the FBI reported that it had not followed protocol when the tip was not forwarded to the Miami Field Office, where further investigative steps would have been taken.[178]

The FBI has been frequently depicted in popular media since the 1930s. The bureau has participated to varying degrees, which has ranged from direct involvement in the creative process of film or TV series development, to providing consultation on operations and closed cases.[179] A few of the notable portrayals of the FBI on television are the 1993–2002 series The X-Files, which concerned investigations into paranormal phenomena by five fictional Special Agents, and the fictional Counter Terrorist Unit (CTU) agency in the TV drama 24, which is patterned after the FBI Counterterrorism Division. The 1991 movie Point Break is based on the true story of an undercover FBI agent who infiltrated a gang of bank robbers. The 1997 movie Donnie Brasco is based on the true story of undercover FBI agent Joseph D. Pistone infiltrating the Mafia. The 2015 TV series Quantico, titled after the location of the Bureau's training facility, deals with Probationary and Special Agents, not all of whom, within the show's format, may be fully reliable or even trustworthy.

^Bonaparte, Charles Joseph. "Annual Report of the Attorney General of the United States, 1908, p.7". Historical Documents from the Bureau's Founding. Federal Bureau of Investigation. Archived from the original on 3 July 2012. Retrieved 14 August 2012. In my last annual report I called attention to the fact that this department was obliged to call upon the Treasury Department for detective service, and had, in fact, no permanent executive force directly under its orders. Through the prohibition of its further use of the Secret Service force, contained in the Sundry Civil Appropriation Act, approved May 27, 1908, it became necessary for the department to organize a small force of special agents of its own. Although such action was involuntary on the part of this department, the consequences of the innovation have been, on the whole, moderately satisfactory. The Special Agents, placed as they are under the direct orders of the Chief Examiner, who receives from them daily reports and summarizes these each day to the Attorney General, are directly controlled by this department, and the Attorney General knows or ought to know, at all times what they are doing and at what cost.

^Vanderpool, Bill (August 22, 2011). "A History of FBI Handguns". American Rifleman. National Rifle Association. The only personally owned handguns now on the approved list are the Glock 21 (full-size .45 ACP), the Glock 26 (sub-compact 9 mm) and the 27 (sub-compact .40 S&W).

^Vanderpool, Bill (August 22, 2011). "A History of FBI Handguns". American Rifleman. National Rifle Association. Also in the ’80s, HRT adopted the Browning Hi-Power. The first Hi-Powers were customized by Wayne Novak and later ones by the FBI gunsmiths at Quantico. They were popular with the “super SWAT” guys, and several hesitated to give them up when they were replaced by .45 ACP single-action pistols, the first ones built by Les Baer, which used high-capacity Para Ordnance frames. Later, Springfield Armory’s “Bureau Model” replaced the Baer guns. Field SWAT teams were also issued .45s, and most still use them.

^"RO® ELITE SERIES". Springfield Armory. Every new RO Elite series pistol is clad in the same Black-T® treatment specified on Springfield Armory 1911s built for the FBI’s regional SWAT and Hostage Rescue Teams.

^FBI Secrets: An Agent's Expose. M. Wesley Swearingen. Boston. South End Press. 1995. Special Agent Gregg York: "We expected about twenty Panthers to be in the apartment when the police raided the place. Only two of those black nigger fuckers were killed, Fred Hampton and Mark Clark."